Then he sat down at his desk and quietly wrote out a certificate of the death of Pasley Carew, of Croome Hall, Gentleman, through the administration of a dose of strychnine in mistake for distilled water, in a sleeping-draught compounded by Dr Wulfrey Dale. And he thought, as he wrote the word, of the awful pandemonium Pasley Carew, Gentleman, had created in his own household these last seven days.

He enclosed this in a covering letter to Dr Tamplin, the coroner, in which he explained more fully how the mistake had occurred. The bottles containing the strychnine and the distilled water stood side by side on his shelf. He had come in tired from a long country round.

Had remembered the draught to be sent up to the Hall. As to the rest, he could not tell how he came to make such a mistake. But there it was, and he only was to blame. He could only express his profound regret and accept the consequences.

Then, having completed his doc.u.ments, instead of galloping off to see his waiting patients, he sat down before the fire and let his thoughts play gloomily over the whole matter. His man was off delivering medicines, and would not be back till midday. Time enough if Tamplin got his letter during the afternoon. As to his own patients, he had run rapidly over them in his own mind, and saw that there was no one vitally demanding his attention. He could not go his rounds and say nothing, and the thought of carrying the news of his own default was too much for him. As soon as the matter got bruited about, he thought grimly, there would probably be a run on Dr Newman's services, which would greatly astonish and delight that gentleman and would compensate him for all his months of weary waiting.

It was a good thing for Elinor, he thought, as he sat staring into the fire, that he was not married. If he had had a wife and children, they must have gone into the scale against her, and she must certainly have been hanged.

Quite impossible to bring it in as an accident on her part. That he had seen at a glance. The jury would be composed of neighbours, and in spite of the placid face she had turned to the world, it was well enough known that she and Pasley had not lived happily together. And though the fault of that was not imputed to her, every man's thought would inevitably jump to the worst, and condemn her even before she did it out of her own mouth, which she most certainly would do the moment she opened it to explain matters.

No, this was the only possible way. If the cost was heavy, he was more capable of bearing it than she. In any case he could not hand her over to the hangman. That was out of the question.

He could pretty well forecast the consequences. His practice would be ruined, for who would trust a doctor capable of so fatal a mistake? He would have to go away and start life afresh elsewhere. It would have to be somewhere where he was quite unknown, or this thing would dog him all his life. Some new country perhaps,--say Canada or the States.

Gad, it was a heavy price to pay for a foolish woman's lapse!

He would not be penniless, of course. His father had laid by a considerable sum in the course of his long and busy life. If necessary he could live in quiet comfort, without working, for the rest of his days. But it was hard to break away like this from all that had so far const.i.tuted his life. A heavy price to pay for mere sentiment--but not too heavy for a woman's life!

There was no doubt of his having to go. The question was whether he should go at once, or wait till there was nothing left to wait for.

It would be dismal and weary work waiting. But going would feel like bolting, and he had never run from trouble in his life. As a matter of fact he had never until now had any serious trouble to face, but now that it had come he found himself in anything but a running humour.

If there had been anything to fight he would have rejoiced in the melee and plunged into it with ardour. But here was nothing to be fought.

By his own deliberate act he was labelling himself untrustworthy, and no uttermost striving on his part could rehabilitate him. For the essence of healing is faith, and a doctor who has forfeited one's confidence is worse than no doctor at all.

VIII

In the afternoon he sent off his man on horseback with the letter to Dr Tamplin, and towards evening he came galloping back with this very characteristic reply:

"MY DEAR WULFREY,

Shocking business and I'm sorely grieved about whole matter. Humanum est errare, but a doctor's not supposed to. Good thing for us we're not always found out. Could you not bring yourself to certify death as result of the accident? I consider it a mistake to admit the possibility of such a thing, so d--d damaging to the profession. And have you considered the matter from your own point of view? Cannot fail to have bad effect. Perhaps give that new fellow just the chance he's been waiting for. ---- him!

Think it over again, my boy, from all points, and be wise. I return certificate. Your man will tell you all about my fall. My cob stumbled over a stone last night and broke me a leg and two ribs. I'm too heavy for that kind of thing and he's a ---- fool! But it was very dark and we're neither of us as young as we were. For all our sakes I hope you'll come through this all right. We can't spare you. And it might come to that. Remember what silly sheep folks are.

Yours truly, THOMAS TAMPLIN."

Just like the dear, easy-going old boy, fall and all, thought Wulfrey, and the advice tendered and the course suggested did not greatly surprise him. But he had to make allowances for the old man's age and easy-goingness, and his lack of detailed knowledge of all the circ.u.mstances of the case,--how almost impossible it would be to ascribe Carew's death to the accident, even if he could have brought himself to do so.

The old man's own shelving would add greatly to the unpleasantness of the situation, for, as deputy-coroner, he would have to call a jury himself, and submit the matter to their consideration and himself to their verdict.

However, there was no way out of that, so he set to work at once and sent out his summonses, calling the inquest for ten o'clock the next morning, at the Hall; and to relieve Elinor as much as possible, he gave orders to the undertaker at Brentham to do all that was necessary, and sent her word that he had done so.

Early next morning, before he was up, young Job was knocking on his front door, with half the pack yelping and leaping outside the gate.

"Well, Job? What's it now?" he asked, from his bedroom window.

"That gal Mollie says you better come up and see th' missus----"

"Why? What's wrong with her?"

"_I_ d'n know, n' more don't Mollie. _She_ thinks she's had a stroke."

"Wait five minutes and I'll go back with you," and in five minutes they were crunching through the lanes, all hard underfoot with frost that lay like snow, and white and gay with hedge-row lacery of spiders' webs in feathery festoons, and, up above, a crimson sun rising slowly through the mist-banks over the bare black trees.

"What makes Mollie think your mistress has had a stroke?" asked the Doctor. "What does Mollie know about strokes?"

"I d'n know. 'Sims to me she've had a stroke,' was her very words.

She've just laid on her bed all day an' all night without speakin' a word, Mollie says,--eatin' noth'n, and drinkin' noth'n, which is onnat'ral; an' sayin' noth'n, which in a woman is onnat'ral too."

"She was quite worn out with nursing Mr Carew."

"Like enough. He _wur_ a handful an' no mistake. Th' house is a deal quieter wi'out him. But who's goin' to run th' pack?--that's what bothers me."

"Don't you worry, Job. Someone will turn up to run the pack all right."

"Mebbe, but it depends on who 'tis. Why not yourself now, Doctor?"

"That's a great compliment, Job, and I appreciate it. But," with a shake of the head, "I'll have other work to do," and he wondered grimly where that work might lie.

Mollie took him straight up to Mrs Carew's room, where she lay just as she had sunk down on the bed when he sent her away the previous morning.

"She's nivver spoke nor moved since she dropped down there yes'day,"

whispered Mollie impressively. "I covered her up, but she took no notice. An' I brought her up her dinner and her supper but she's never ate a bite."

"Get me a cup of hot milk with an egg and a gla.s.s of sherry beaten up in it, Mollie," he whispered back. "And I'll see if I can induce her to take it. You did quite right to send for me," and Mollie hurried away with a more hopeful face.

Elinor lay there with her eyes closed and a rigid, stricken look on her white face, a picture of hopeless despair. But Wulfrey's quick glance had caught the flutter of her heavy lids, and the gleam of terrified enquiry that had shot through them, as they came into the room, and he understood.

He bent over her and whispered, "I have made it all right, Elinor. You need have no further fears----"

"They will not hang me?" she whispered, and looked up into his face with all the terrors of the night still in her woful eyes.

"No one will know anything about it unless you tell them yourself. You will eat something now, and then you had better lie still. Get some sleep if you can or you will make yourself ill. If you fell ill you might say things you should not, you know."

She struggled up on to one elbow. "You are quite sure they will not hang me?" she whispered again.

"Quite sure, unless you are so foolish as to tell them all about it."

"I have felt the rope round my neck all night. Oh, it was terrible in the dark. It was terrible ... terrible----" and she felt about her pretty white neck with her trembling hands.

"Forget all about it now. I have made all the necessary arrangements.

There will have to be an inquest. It will be held here---"